Why does your dog lick his nose often?

If you also see that your dog He licks his nose often you should investigate further: in these cases you need to contact the vet

If you also have a dog you will surely be used to see him lick his nose from time to time and as a result it doesn't seem to be unusual behavior at all. In fact, for a dog it is a normal gesture, which however must be reduced to a few episodes.

If it had to become a habit and a constant attitude, repeated several times a day, could hide some deeper meanings. When it is no longer a sporadic episode could indicate a problem which needs to be investigated further: it could be a problem of a physical or psychological nature.

Basically a dog licks its nose because keeping it moist and hydrated helps to perceive smells better: the nose is the main organ for these animals, which compared to us have gods olfactory receptors 50 times more powerful.

If you start licking yourself several times during the day it could be due to one of the following reasons:

• Trauma, bites or foreign bodies: in these cases we talk about a wound to the nose, an abrasion or a lesion; or even a bite or sting caused by an insect or by the presence of a foreign body inside the dog's nose.
• An illness or infection: if the dog has a dental problem, one of the symptoms could be the fact that it constantly licks its lips and nose; Likewise, an infection could cause excessive nasal discharge to make the dog feel the need to lick itself.

The psychological reasons that lead your dog to lick his nose are the most difficult to identify

In addition to purely physical reasons, there may be others linked to gods behavioral or psychological problemswhich are often more complicated to identify, such as the following:

• Excessive stress or nervousness: when a dog feels anxious, scared or in a situation that makes him uncomfortable, he may start licking his nose as if to communicate his emotional state and at the same time to try to reduce the stress he feels.
• Obsessive compulsive disorder: some animals suffer from this problem, which leads them to repeat an action or behavior excessively.

If you see that your dog continues to lick his nose insistently or in any case much more often than usual, it would be better to contact the vet in order to delve deeper into the causes of this behavior. In this way, if there is any underlying discomfort, it can be resolved appropriately. In any case, the dog should never be punished for nervousness, but we must try to approach him with patience and understanding, even more so when he is facing a period of stress.

In case your dog should instead have a nosebleedstruggling to breathe and sneezing violently, it would be best to take him immediately to a veterinary center for an emergency visit.